Local historians Claire Weiss, Peter Ashan, and Geoff Nicholls will launch their book on how the slave trade abolition movement is connected to Leytonstone tomorrow evening at St John’s Church Hall
Authors of a revelatory book documenting the connection Leytonstone has to the slave trade abolition movement will host a free talk in St John’s Church Hall tomorrow evening.
Slave-trade Abolition and Leytonstone House: the Sansoms, the Buxtons and Black History by Claire Weiss, Geoff Nicholls and Peter Ashan was published this Black History Month by the Leyton and Leytonstone Historical Society, and will be available for just £7 at the free launch event on Wednesday 16th October.
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The talk, which is open to all, starts at 7.45pm in St John’s Church Hall between St John’s Church and the new Aldi store.
Focussing on one of Leytonstone’s rare surviving Georgian buildings, this book addresses the untold story of how the Sansoms, originally woolcard-making artisans from Colchester, took up residence there in 1795, and examines the anomaly of Philip Sansom’s career as a City of London merchant banker while at the same time being a founder of the 1787 slave-trade Abolitionist Committee.
A special chapter Black History in Leytonstone 17th to 19th centuries traces the background of Aina Sarah Forbes Bonetta Davies, a former enslaved Black African woman who visited the Fowell Buxtons at Leytonstone House in 1866.
In enhancing the more widely-known accounts of the Leytonstone House origins and the philanthropic Buxton family’s residence there, the study explores the building plans of 1767 and notable residents of the 18th century.
Read more about the history of Leytonstone House here
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